Just Another Bloody Day at Bloody School
by Azalea Lodestar
Summary: Rory Peace is your average girl...maybe not so average. Spunky, stubborn, and the owner of a fiery temper, she's one of the more interesting people at Sky High. Famously divorced parents, having unwanted attention...that's the drama called high school.
1. Enter Fiery Rebel

Disclaimer: I don't own Sky High…but I do sort-of own Rory, Jake Daniels, Nat Stronghold, etc. Let's just say that I don't own anything from the movie…happy?

"_Mom_, you're _going_ to make me _late_!"

Like most people my age, I enjoyed the overuse of italics, exasperation, and extreme annoyance, and the three of them were often used all in one sentence, such as this one. I'm a rather average-looking sort of person, not the Juliet of my time but not the Hunchback of Notre Dame, either. I was one of those people who could eat tons and never gain an ounce, and therefore I was a skinny girl of fourteen, taller than average yet not tall enough to make people stare. My wavy waist-length hair was a sleek jet-black and was currently tied in a ponytail with a navy blue scrunchie that coincidentally matched my eyes. An expression of extreme annoyance was on my face as Mom fussed over the hat on my head, which had been flipped backwards by me, myself, and I.

"But don't you think it's a bit…_tomboyish_?" Mom asked me worriedly. "You wouldn't want to make a bad impression on anyone, would you, Rory?"

I rolled my eyes and tapped my foot impatiently. If I'd had my way, I'd have been at the bus stop fifteen minutes ago. But my mother, like all worrywarts mothers were these days, was very fussy about my appearance. "I don't _care_," I declared for the fifty-millionth time. "And I can't believe that after raising me for nearly fifteen years, you still haven't realized that I _am_ a tomboy." Here I rolled my eyes again. They were starting to get tired from being rolled too long – that happened a lot when I was with my totally mother-ish mother. "Can I go _now_?"

Mom gave me one of those looks, and I sighed. "Blegh…now tell me again how exactly I'm supposed to make friends at this place if I'm going to be late, I don't have any powers, and people think I'm a b – " Another one of those looks, another sigh from me.

"I'm sure you'll do _fine_," Mom answered, picking at my shirt with a look of distaste on her face. "But you'll probably get your powers soon…you're just a late bloomer, that's all."

I snorted. "So can I go _now_?"

Mom looked as if she would refuse, but then she sighed and said, "Fine." That did it for me. I gave my mother a quick hug, grabbed my huge black-and-gray messenger bag, and dashed out the door. I could tell from the look on my beloved mom's face that she'd wanted to freeze me (literally) in my tracks.

"And don't forget – stay away from the Strongholds!" Mom called behind me, thankfully not carrying out with the plan in her head.

I rolled my eyes as I sped away. As if I needed reminding. For some reason, Mom had something against Will and Layla Stronghold, who lived on the other side of town. It was oddly curious, but every time I'd asked my mother about it, she'd pursed her lips and stabbed anything within reach with a pencil, and it had never failed to amuse me, so I didn't question any further. Good entertainment was _so _hard to find these days.

When I finally reached the corner between Rowan Drive and Potato Ave., the bus was already there, waiting for me – or so it seemed. A rather heavy man in a yellow uniform sat at the driver's seat, his nametag reading 'Don Wilson – Bus Driver'. I quirked a brow at his ordinary appearance but got on the bus anyway.

"So, er…_Don_, this _is_ the bus to Sky H – " I was cut off by the act of Don Wilson's hand clamping over my mouth, which caused a 'mmph'ing sound that in turn caused the people on the bus to stare.

"Be quiet!" Don hissed. "Do you really want every supervillain in this neighborhood to know we're here?" I just stared at him as the doors closed; I really couldn't do anything else because of shock. My mother was worrying about _me_ making a bad impression? This dude was getting on my nerves already; I had a feeling that clamping your hand on someone's mouth the moment you met them was _not_ an example of making a good impression. Geez.

Finally Don withdrew his hand, staring suspiciously at me. "What's your name, freshman?" he asked, though it was more of a demand than an inquiry.

"First, ever heard of any manners? Second, you should wash your hands – personal hygiene, you know. And third, I'm Auroria. Auroria Hale. Auroria Peace. Rory. Blah. Whatever." Teenage drabble.

Don's eyes widened slightly. "Hale? Peace?" he stuttered. I rolled my eyes again. Man, they were starting to ache. "As in Aurelia Hale and Warren Peace? Ice and Fire? The divorced heroes?"

There I went again, rolling her eyes. I'd definitely need eye drops after this. "Yes, yes, yes, yes, and if you talk about that again I will personally make sure you have a broken nose before I leave this bus," I stated simply, wearing a weary expression, yet eyes flashing dangerously at the word 'divorced'. "Savvy?"

Don gulped and I walked through the aisle with the appearance of a coolly dangerous tomboy – which, as a matter of fact, I was. I had my temper and reputation to make up for the fact that I hadn't acquired any powers yet, so I was partly satisfied. Students stared as I passed and walked to the very back of the bus, casually dropping my bag into the seat next to me expressionlessly. Silence hung heavy and thick over the other occupants of the bus until Don shrugged and drove on.

At the next few stops, nothing interesting happened, but on the fifth after mine, a familiar-looking boy climbed up the steps onto the bus. His hair was a longish light brown color that could be described as a caramel-ish color (hey, I was hungry – living with Mom also meant that you could get so annoyed you forgot to grab something to eat). His eyes were brown also, tinted with hints of gold and hazel. But I didn't pay much attention to his appearance, or him by himself at all. This was Nathaniel Stronghold, only son of Will and Layla Stronghold, the kid Mom had warned me about. He didn't look dangerous, much, but you could never tell with these people. Look at me, for instance. Innocent goody-goody on the outside, all temper and spunk on the inside.

However, I was prevented from burning a hole into Stronghold's head by staring by the clearing of a throat. My head whipped up as I turned my gaze on a tall dude standing half-in front, half-next to me. Diagonal or whatever. He had a weird sense of style, wearing black-and-white stripes for a top, but I suppose the look suited him. I also suppose he was quite good-looking, tall and skinny, yet well built. His hair, a dark brown sort of color, fell into his gray eyes with a casual sort of elegance. It must have taken ages to make it look that perfect.

"What do you want?" I asked snappishly. I wasn't in the best of moods right now.

"_You_ – " He pointed to me. " – are _sitting_ – " He motioned the act of sitting down. " – in _my_ – " He pointed to himself. " – seat." He patted the seat next to mine.

I raised an eyebrow, fighting to keep a straight face. "Oh, so _that_ was why you were acting like some sort of deranged monkey!" I exclaimed sarcastically. "Oh, and there was me, thinking it all had to do with mental problems. My bad." Not the greatest of comebacks, but the reaction was satisfactory.

The corners of the boy's mouth tightened, and I could tell that he was struggling with himself not to beat the stuffing out of me. Now I was describing myself as some sort of turkey…what was the world coming to? Then the stupid kid just put on his dorky smirk again and just plopped down on the seat next to me. Talk about rude. I glared at him menacingly.

"Anyway, I'm Jake Daniels, sophomore." He spoke as if he was the king of the world.

I rolled my eyes. "And I care because…?" I retorted.

"Because I am simply the best-looking male specimen in the entire school population at Sky High," Daniels answered promptly. Honestly, today I probably made an eye-rolling record.

"Yeah, yeah, cut the crap," I said. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't have sworn, since that's so not me, but these weren't normal circumstances, so I did swear. Even an idiot could have figured that one out.

"Spunky one, eh?" Daniels questioned, but it was more of an amused statement than a question. "Your name, freshman?"

Rolled my eyes, blew a lock of hair out of face, stared at the dude, and the rest of the clichéd blabber. "The most clichéd cliché of all clichés, it seems," I remarked. "But since you asked _so_ nicely, it's Auroria. Auroria Hale. Auroria Peace. Rory. Blah. Whatever." Talk about repetition.

"The only daughter of Warren Peace and Aurelia Hale…yeah, I've heard of you," Daniels replied nonchalantly. "Well, here's news for you – _my_ parents are Royal Pain and Lash. Or Sue Tenny and Lash Daniels. Or Gwen Grayson and Jake Daniels." He shrugged. "Does it really matter?"

"Okay, I'm lost…I thought _you_ were Jake Daniels," I said cautiously, puzzled.

"Named after my father…duh." It sounded like the first time he'd used the delightful word by the way he was rolling it off his tongue, like he was tasting some foreign food thing. I'm not very good with description, okay?

"That's all very nice, now could you please leave me alone to plan out my first day at the blasted school without any bloody superpowers?" I asked him as politely as I could through gritted teeth. He was trying my patience, and if you asked around, people would tell you I wasn't very well known for it. Or rather, that I had none. Funny, how people can tell these things.

Daniels raised an eyebrow skeptically, and I decided immediately that I hated the way he did that. That I hated everything about the dude. Nothing new. "Ha-ha. Very nice joke," he said, rolling his eyes. Damn the copycat!

"Ha-ha. I'm a comedian – not." I leaned back in my seat and began to ignore the sophomore's presence, which was very easy to do since he wasn't saying anything anyways.

"Wait…so you mean you don't have any powers?" Nod. "You _are_ the daughter of Warren Peace and Aurelia Hale, right?" Nod. "And you don't have any powers?" Nod, muttered comment 'I thought we discussed that already'. "Wow." Nod, the action of taking out an MP3 and headphones, wearing headphones, listening to favorite band – that happens to be Green Day.

Daniels pulled out one of my headphone things. Damn this kid was annoying. "What do you want now?" I asked him irritably, still listening to 'When I Come Around' with the other headphone thing.

He was saved from the trouble of answering by a shout from Don, seatbelt things shooting from out of nowhere and buckling themselves around people, and a THUMPing sound as the bus started to…fly?

"What the bloody frigging hell is going on?" I demanded Daniels as I quickly shut off my MP3 and re-deposited it into my bag.

"We're going to the school, you ruddy pest!" was his friendly reply. Note the sarcasm.

The bus went through a series of loop-de-loops, sharp swerves, dives, and things of that sort you experience on a roller coaster or some other randomly hilariously dangerous ride. Which, might I add, I have probably been on millions of times before. Muhaha. Call me a daredevil. Then I was greeted again with the pleasant THUMP that signified our landing. The seatbelt things snaked away, to my relief, and I was able to sling my messenger bag over my shoulder again.

I made my way across the aisle, not bothering to say anything to anyone as I passed, as the doors creaked open. Boy, did they need oiling. Rolling my eyes for the million gazillionth time, I jumped off to catch my first glimpse of high school.


	2. The 'Sorting Hat'

Disclaimer: Ditto. Blah.

-

Normal POV

Rory snorted as she looked up at Sky High. From what she'd heard, it was the greatest school of all great schools and she should be proud to attend. Quoted, of course, from her mother. But, in her very experienced eyes, it was just high school. Sure, it was a bit glossier and neater and all those detailed necessities, but it was _school_. And school sucked. Everyone knew that.

"I can see you're not very happy with the arrangements," Jake Daniels remarked as he walked up to stand next to her.

"Go away, you stalker," Rory snapped. "I'm not in the mood to listen to you." She elapsed into thought for a moment, then added, "I'm never in the mood to listen to you, so shove off."

Daniels snorted; did the guy just live to mimic everything she did? "Uh-huh."

"Uh-huh," Rory agreed, rolling her eyes. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have better things to do than hang around with you all day, as hurt as you may get by this comment. So can you shove off _now_?"

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"_Yes_."

"_No_."

"YES!"

"Fine!" And he shoved off.

Surprised slightly yet definitely pleased by Daniels' 'shoving off', Rory strided toward the doors, seemingly gliding across the school grounds as she did so. A girl with freaky snot-green hair was handing out schedules and lecturing them on the rules, the first of them being not to fall off the school.

"I thought that'd be pretty obvious," she said loudly, and the comment was met by various snorting and laughter from the rest of the freshmen.

The green-haired girl's head whipped around to face her. "Name, freshman."

"First of all, how come almost everyone I meet asks me that?" Rory wondered out loud, rolling her eyes. "And for your info, it's Auroria…or Rory, because if you call me Auroria I'll personally smash my fist into your face, and you really don't want that, do you?"

"Auroria what?" the girl inquired immediately.

"Geez, you people are really nosy," Rory remarked. "Auroria Hale. Or Peace. Either way I'm going to punch you."

The girl didn't even flinch. Instead, she smiled rather confidently, though it was more of a smirk than a smile. "Oh, really?" she said in a superior tone that made Rory want to gag. "Well, _Rory_, the name's Jeanette Williams." _As if I care,_ the younger girl thought rebelliously. "I'm your brother's girlfriend."

Rory did a double take. "My who's whatta?" she sputtered, dark blue eyes bulging out of their sockets. "Sorry, what I _meant_ to say was WHAT THE BLOODY HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!"

"You don't know?" Jeanette asked, faking surprise with the sappy smile still on her face. "You mean you _seriously_ don't know?"

"Oh, cut the drama and get on with it!" Rory cried, her voice rising to a shout so that everyone in the vicinity paused to watch the scene.

Jeanette rolled her eyes. "Your _brother_ – " Here Rory stared, still not over the shock of the words. " – is _my_ boyfriend."

"I heard that part, but tell me…just _who_ is this brother of mine? And if you're joking – which you probably are, since no one in their right mind would go out with you – who're you trying to kid?" Rory demanded, eyes blazing.

"Your _brother_. You know, Gareth Peace," Jeanette said slowly.

"Doesn't ring a bell."

"You mean, no one's told you?"

"Yep."

"You mean your mother hasn't told you?"

"Yep."

"You mean you never knew?"

"Yep."

"Wow."

"You betcha."

The day's events were _really_ starting to freak Rory out. First with the whole repetition thing going on with introducing herself to everyone and them freaking out over her name, which freaked _her_ out. Then there was the green-haired thing going on with Jeanette. What was up with that? And now there was this whole 'your brother's my boyfriend' thing she was getting from the same girl. If she even _had_ a brother, she was sure he couldn't be as stupid as to go out with someone like Jeanette – look at her hair!

"Okay, so now that this very interesting conversation has reached its end, can we please go back to the Student Orientation thing?" This came from Nat Stronghold, who, despite his words, looked amused, as did the rest of the crowd. Rory glowered at him, which he, in turn, returned with a full-blast smirk.

"Gladly," Jeanette answered, turning to the fifteen-year-old with a bright smile. Nat looked like he was in heaven. Rory simply made a face. "So, as I was saying, schedules…"

Rory tuned the girl off after turning her MP3 on again, deciding that there were much better things to do than listen to the annoying green-haired girl at the moment. And, as proof, she could name a lot of things on the top of her head. One: listen to music. Two: think of ways to get detention. Three: keep glaring daggers at Stronghold. Four: watch that nerd – Zacharias or something like that – pick his nose. Five: Die of boredom.

"Peace…Peace…PEACE!"

Jeanette's loud and irritatingly bossy voice interrupted Kelly Clarkson's 'Because of You' – which was playing on the FM radio – and reached Rory's ears, causing the girl to wince as she switched the music off.

"What? Do you have like, supersonic voice or something?" she exclaimed, fingers replacing the earphones as they clamped tight around her ears.

"No, I just glow," Jeanette replied, rolling her eyes. "And I've been calling you for like, the last five minutes. Come up and get your schedule." It was Rory's turn to roll her eyes as she strolled upto the sophomore and snatched the papers, held together neatly with a paperclip, from her hands.

"Oh, and my so-called 'brother'…what's his name again? Well, whatever his name is, tell him he's the greatest git ever and that I never thought anyone related to me could stoop as low as to go out with someone like you." She smirked. "And that flashing of the eyes thing really doesn't work for you, though it really demonstrates that 'glowing' thing you were talking about." The word 'thing' dominated over her vocabulary, since she usually couldn't find a better word to place in her languid remarks. Unless she felt like using very, um, _colorful_ language. That happened when she got pissed off, which was very often.

"And it's _Gareth_," Jeanette hissed behind Rory as said girl headed toward the doors. The bell rang.

-

Rory's POV

Gym. Principal. Comets. Speech. Boredom.

Those five words practically summed up the whole sucky time we freshmen had when we entered the oh-so-beloved walls of the school. Well, for me, anyway. Everyone kept glancing at me as if they were afraid I would blow up any minute, but I don't blow up…not, at least, when I'm dead bored.

And that's exactly what I was right then.

And – just great – guess who I had the greatest pleasure of standing next to? Yep, Nat Stronghold, bleeding idiot extraordinaire. Yay! Git. For some reason, he kept glancing at me with a calculating, sort-of-amused look every few seconds, which made me feel like some exotic animal on display. Well, I couldn't argue with the 'exotic' part, but for the rest, as if! I would have told him to shove off, like I did with Daniels (and boy did that relieve stress) if it hadn't been for the fact that Powers was looking straight at me. Yet again, for some reason. Everyone seemed to have some reason to either – a)

stare at, b) make fun of, c) (and yes, this was the most popular one, unfortunately for me) want to annoy to death, or d) all of the above – me. Rather annoying, really.

Again with the comets. God, this woman was obsessed with drama, wasn't she? 'Comets, away'? I couldn't think of anyone who'd say such a corny line. Except for Powers, that is.

Then this Coach Boomer dude – who looked like he was in his seventies or something – started using his supersonic vocal powers (hey, at least someone in the school had them) to lecture us about power placement and 'whiner babies'. This school was weird. But I wasn't going to survive it if I didn't have a power – which, as a matter of fact, I didn't. Surprise, surprise!

Boomer was going by backwards-alphabetical order. But hey, in these times, people can go _way_ off their rocker. The example stood right in front of me…well, except he was standing on this huge platform thing. I blinked. Was that supposed to impress us, or was it just to make Boomer look taller?

I shrugged to myself and sighed dramatically, blatantly ignoring the amused smirks people were shooting at me. If this was entertainment, school life must be _really_ boring. And going back to the backwards-alphabetical thing I mentioned about a minute ago in my brain, if they were going by Hale, phew – I'd be one of the last. If they were going by Peace…well, we'll get to that later.

When I'd finally tuned back into the power-placing, Boomer had called Jane Williams. Shape-shifter…into a guinea pig? I stifled a snort and sobered up immediately when I reminded myself I didn't even have any powers to laugh at. "SIDEKICK!" Ouch…forget about eye drops, I need another pair of ears!

A few names later, Stronghold was called up. Boomer seemed impressed by the dude. Snort…from whom else but moi? Stronghold flew, grew some weird-looking plants. Car came, he dodged it. Piano came, he wrapped it with some vine things. Yeah…_very_ impressive. Sarcasm is dripping from the voice of my inner thoughts.

"HERO!" Now who couldn't have seen _that_ coming?

After the hated Nat Stronghold were Katrina Sullivan, Tabitha Samuels, and Courtney Reynolds. Females dominate. Sullivan had electrical powers, Samuels was telekinetic, and Reynolds was a force field machine. There were no Q's, and since 'Peace' was the first last name in the P's in backwards-alphabetical order (so confusing – the idiot who created the backwards-alphabet should be turned into frog spawn), if he didn't call me now (and I had my hopes on that) my suffering would be ceased until the H's.

"Zacharias Parker."

I breathed a sigh of relief as Zacharias – the kid with the huge thick-lens glasses that had been picking his nose – stepped up onto the platform. Good…this would save me a _lot_ of trouble. Until, that is, he reached 'Hale'. That I didn't want to think about. Ah, just look at me. Rory Hale/Peace, the never-frightened spunky girl known mostly for the sharp temper and dry comebacks, just shaking in her knees because of some stupid power placement. Oh, the irony.

"My mistake…Parker, step down." Boomer's voice boomed out, echoing across the gym. "Next person, get ready to power up. Auroria – " He paused there, his eyes widening as he gulped. " – Auroria Peace."

Heads turned, eyes stared, throats gulped, and Parker's nose was thoroughly picked. Disguising my utmost embarrassment behind another famous roll of the eyes, I walked upto Boomer and stared at him critically. A long pause hung in the air as Boomer nervously averted his eyes to the ground. Honestly, there was no reason for him to do that…sure, Dad was the most powerful pyrokinetic alive and Mom was the most powerful hydrokinetic alive, but I was a kid…with no powers.

But he didn't know that…yet.

The long pause was interrupted by a loud voice. "Well, shouldn't you be powering up, Peace?" This time the heads turned toward the doorway, where a group of older people were standing, watching the power assessment. I recognized Jake Daniels' smug smirk as he calmly returned the rolling-of-the-eyes thing I had shot at him. But arrogance will be arrogance, and Daniels was the incarnation of arrogance. I shot him a deadly glare. If looks could kill, the dude would be lying on the floor in a pool of blood with me standing triumphantly over him. But as it happened, I didn't kill people and never wanted to, either. But that didn't mean I couldn't be mad at the guy. He _knew_ I didn't have any powers!

"Yes…POWER UP!" Boomer ordered, regaining his confidence and abnormally loud voice when he realized he'd been bettered – was that a word? – by a sixteen-year-old. I winced, being in close proximity of the snothead, tried in earnest to ignore the superior looks I was receiving from Daniels and his friends (which included snot-haired Williams), then faced the 'Sorting Hat'.

"Don't have any," I answered.

"Don't have any _WHAT_?" Boomer demanded. I rolled my eyes despite my awkward position and mumbled something about how thick people could get these days.

"I don't have any _powers_, you fricking retard."

Gasps filled the room, Boomer's face was contorted with something beyond fury, Daniels' smirk was unbearable now, and I didn't even bother looking at Jeanette Williams.

"You're wasting my time…SIIIIIIIIIDEKICK!" That was the loudest I'd heard anyone shout, even for Boomer. Rubbing my numb ears, I leaped back down onto the gym floor, still being able to maintain cool composure while doing it. _Late bloomer_…ha. Wait till Mom heard about _this_.


End file.
